Let Every Heart Prepare Him Room.

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"As Josiah became king at age 8, he followed in his ancestor David's footsteps and obeyed God. One of the first steps he took was to remove all idols in the kingdom.”

Faithful Christians love and obey God and should remove idols from their own lives.

It was the apostle John's final warning to his readers. "Little children, guard yourselves from idols. (1 John 5:21) "Watch out," says John. "Be on guard against anything that might occupy the place in your heart that should be reserved for God."

John never qualified that warning. the aged apostle deliberately refrained from classifying the idols or giving us a comprehensive list to follow. It's an unconditional command. ANY idol, regardless of its beauty or usefulness or original purpose, is to be set aside so that Christ might reign supreme, without a single competitor.

I don't have many temptations to worship evil things. It's the good things that plague me. It isn't as difficult for me to reject something that is innately bad or wrong as it is to keep those good and wholesome things off the throne. That, I believe is where the battle line begins.

Honestly now, can you testify to the fact that you've destroyed the idols? That Christ reigns without rival? Or would you have to admit to a personal shrine in your inner temple where you privately burn incense?...

Your Lord and Savior wants to occupy first place. Matthew 6:33 says that when He has it, everything else will be added to you.

How long HAS it been since you've enlisted your Lord’s help in a private, personal, temple-cleansing session? It's so easy to get attracted to idols- good things, inappropriately adorned. But when you have Jesus in the center of the room, everything else only junks up the decor."

From Come Before Winter by Charles Swindoll.

This devotional hit me dead on this morning. It is a culmination of many little words that God has given to me in the past year. In past months God has been showing me that my hunger for fellowship, which in and of itself would be classified as a "good thing", has been something that has consumed me to such a point that I looked at it through a skewed lens, and applied myself heartily to the wrong ends. This place, Facebook, blog hopping, etc.... all things that can be healthy and wholesome and GOOD, had become things that were being used to fill a space in me that HE desired to fill. As Swindoll said so shockingly and convictingly, they had become a shrine at which I regularly burned incense. They weren't being "added" to me. They were fundamental. They were the place I went to get my "fix" and feel uplifted and encouraged and connected.

I recognize that God wants me to feel uplifted and encouraged and connected and at times we really do need that net of fellowship to fall back into, and He has designed it to be just so. But HE wants ME to run to HIM. And if I make the computer the place I run to, I'm missing out on the blessings and grace that only HE can bestow on me. So if you notice that I am a little quieter, a little less present, a little less regular to drop in for a virtual visit, you will know why, and I believe you will understand.